Methods and apparatus for providing social viewing of media content

ABSTRACT

A method for social viewing of media content includes transmitting, to multiple users, media content when the multiple users are members of a common group associated with a social media site (i.e., “friends” or the like) while providing, to the users, an interaction region configured to allow the first user and the second user to share comments with each other regarding the media content via an interaction stream.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application claims priority to U.S. Prov. Pat. Application No.61/747,583, filed Dec. 31, 2012, the contents of which are herebyincorporated by reference.

TECHNICAL FIELD

The present disclosure generally relates to systems and techniques forprocessing, viewing, and selecting media content. More particularly, thepresent disclosure relates to shared viewing of media in the context ofsocial media sites.

BACKGROUND

In recent years, social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter, Google+,and the like have achieved wide popularity. Such sites often allow usersto form groups (e.g., “friends”, “followers”, “circles”, etc.) and shareinformation with other users in those groups. At the same time, optionsfor viewing media content have also increased, expanding beyond standardcable television to place-shifting devices, network streaming, and thelike. Nevertheless, given the vast amount of media content available, itis often difficult for a user to discover content that he or she mightenjoy. Furthermore, it remains difficult for users to share theirthoughts regarding media content in a meaningful, social, and enjoyableway.

It is therefore desirable to create systems and methods that provide asocial context for shared viewing of media. These and other desirablefeatures and characteristics will become apparent from the subsequentdetailed description and the appended claims, taken in conjunction withthe accompanying drawings and this background section.

SUMMARY

A method for social viewing of media content in accordance with oneembodiment includes transmitting, to a first user, media content via anetwork; transmitting, to a second user, the media content via thenetwork, wherein the second user and the first user are members of acommon group associated with a social media site; and providing, to thefirst and second users, an interaction region configured to allow thefirst user and the second user to share comments with each otherregarding the media content via an interaction stream.

A system for providing social viewing of media content in accordancewith one embodiment includes a media player communicatively coupled to asocial media site. The media player is configured to receive mediacontent from a media source. The social media site provides access to afirst user and a second user who are members of a common groupassociated with the social media site, and the social media siteprovides, to the first and second users, an interaction regionconfigured to allow the first user and the second user to share commentswith each other regarding the media content via an interaction stream.

In accordance with another embodiment, non-transitory computer-readablemedium bearing software instructions are configured to cause a processorto perform the steps of transmitting, to a first user, media content viaa network; transmitting, to a second user, the media content via thenetwork, wherein the second user and the first user are members of acommon group associated with a social media site; and providing, to thefirst and second users, an interaction region configured to allow thefirst user and the second user to share comments with each otherregarding the media content via an interaction stream.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWING FIGURES

Exemplary embodiments will hereinafter be described in conjunction withthe following drawing figures, wherein like numerals denote likeelements.

FIG. 1 is a conceptual block diagram of a system in accordance with oneembodiment.

FIG. 2 is a conceptual representation of a shared viewing experience inaccordance with one embodiment.

FIG. 3 is a conceptual view of a status update in accordance with oneembodiment.

FIG. 4 is a flow chart depicting a method in accordance with oneembodiment.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

The following detailed description of the invention is merely exemplaryin nature and is not intended to limit the invention or the applicationand uses of the invention. Furthermore, there is no intention to bebound by any theory presented in the preceding background or thefollowing detailed description.

In general, systems and methods in accordance with the subject matterdescribed herein provide a social context (e.g., via a social media siteaccessible via a network) for shared viewing of media content whileallowing comments, annotations, public discussions, etc. relating to themedia content to be shared as a group. In addition, notifications that auser is viewing particular media content may be communicated to“friends” to initiate such sharing in a social context.

Referring now to the conceptual block diagram shown in FIG. 1, a system100 in accordance with various embodiments generally includes a mediasource (or simply “source”) 102, a media player 104, a social media site106, and one or more users 108. Media source 102 is communicativelycoupled to media player 104 and is configured to provide media content(or simply “content”) 111 to media player 104 while receivinginformation (e.g., a “report” 112) back from media player 104.

Social media site (or simply “site”) 106 is communicatively coupled(e.g., via the Internet) to both media source 102 and media player 104.For simplicity, social media site 106 is illustrated as a single block,but those skilled in the art will recognize that social media site 106might include any number of functional components (servers, processors,databases, etc.) spread out geographically while implementing any numberof services (web services, streaming services, etc.). In this regard,“social media site” is used herein in its conventional sense of a system(typically a website accessible via a web browser over the Internet)that allows users 108, 110, etc. to interact with each other in somefashion and to “follow,” “friend”, or otherwise denote other users asmembers of a common group associated with the social media site. Withoutloss of generality, the term “friends” may be used herein generically torefer to users within the same group, circle, friendship, or the like,regardless of whether the mechanism for formation of such groupsincludes “friending,” “following,” “placing in a circle,” or the like. Anon-limiting list of social media sites includes, for example, Google+,Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, MySpace, and Foursquare.

Users 108 represent any number of individuals or groups configured tointeract with social media site 106 through conventional methods, suchas laptops, desktop computers, smart-phones, tablet computers, and thelike. In this regard, users 108 will typically have an “account” withsocial media site 106 such that certain credential are required forlogging on and interacting with the site and others on the site.

Media source 102 may include a wide range of sources now known or laterdeveloped, including, for example, broadcast television, cabletelevision, satellite television, “video-on-demand” or similar sources,digital video disk (DVD) players and other removable media, video camerasystems, video game consoles, set-top box (STB) systems, Internet mediasources (e.g., YouTube), and the like. In some embodiments, media source102 represents a placeshifting device that incorporates all or a portionof the functionality typically associated with a particular media source102, for example: a hybrid STB or other receiver that providestranscoding and placeshifting features. Such a device may receivesatellite, cable, broadcast and/or other signals that encode televisionprogramming or other content received from an antenna, modem, serverand/or other source. Such devices may also include a content database tosupport a personal or digital video recorder (DVR) feature or othercontent library as appropriate. Stated another way, in some embodiments,media source 102 and a placeshifting device are physically and/orlogically contained within a common component, housing or chassis.

Media player 104 may be any device, component, module, hardware,software and/or the like capable of receiving a media stream (or“content”) from media source 102. In various embodiments, media player104 is a desktop computer, a laptop computer, a tablet computer, amobile phone, a personal digital assistant, a personal media player(such as the ARCHOS products available from the Archos company of Igny,France), a conventional television, or the like. In many embodiments,media player 104 is a general purpose computing device that includes amedia player application that is capable of securely connecting to mediasource 102 and receiving and presenting media content to the user of thedevice as appropriate. In other embodiments, media player 102 is astandalone or other separate hardware device capable of receiving themedia stream and decoding the media stream to provide an output signalthat is presented on a television or other display device.

It will be appreciated that the various blocks illustrated in FIG. 1will typically include a number of additional conventional hardwareand/or software components (e.g., storage, memory, controllers, digitalsignal processors, etc.), which have been left out of the illustrationin the interest of simplicity. For example, media source 102 mightinclude hardware that incorporates an encoder and/or transcoder moduleconfigured to convert audio/video or other data from into a packetizedformat that can be transmitted over a network. Media player 104 isconfigured to provide commands and or to report to one or more of themedia sources 102, e.g., to request a desired input signals from thatmedia source. Such commands may be provided over any convenient wired orwireless interface, such as an infrared or other wireless transmitterthat emulates remote control commands receivable by the media source102.

In accordance with various embodiments, users 108 and 110 are able toview certain media content together (via social media site 106) andcomment, annotate, or otherwise share information regarding that mediacontent. Referring now to FIGS. 2 and 3 in conjunction with FIG. 1, anexample of such an interaction will now be described.

FIG. 2 depicts a media content region 201 in which certain media content202 (e.g., streamed video, audio, etc.) is provided along with anassociated interaction region 204 as those regions might appeardisplayed within, for example, a conventional web browser window or viaany display coupled to media player 104. As shown, interaction region204 allows multiple users (in this example, “Bob” and “Alice”) tocomment and interact in real-time (or at different times) as mediacontent 202 is viewed by the users. The resulting discussion is referredto as the “interaction stream.”

In this example, the user providing the comment is provided in the textstream (or “chat stream”) within interaction region 204. In someembodiments, time-stamps relating to a position within media content 202may be provided. In various embodiments, users may share withininteraction region 204 annotations, observations, comments, links toexternal sites (e.g., websites relating to a particular show), hashtags(i.e., keywords relating to a subject, event, etc.) relating to thecontent, and the like.

Comments, text, links, images, and other content provided by users 108and/or 110 (entered via a keyboard or other user input method) arereceived by social media site 106 (e.g., via the Internet) along withmedia content from source 102 and/or media player 104. Social media site106 then combines the two as shown in FIG. 2. At any given moment, oneuser might view media content received from media source 102, whileanother views the same media content from media player 104. That is, theultimate source of the media content 202 might be invisible to theusers. In other embodiments, users may select the media source to beused.

Multiple users may view and comment on media content image 202 inreal-time, or may do so at a later time or date. In the case of delayedviewing, comments made by one or more friends at certain previous timesmay be stored and displayed at the appropriate time—i.e., synched withmedia content 202.

In the illustrated embodiment, media content region 201 is showndirectly adjacent and above interaction region 204; however, theinvention is not so limited, and any convenient layout scheme for thevarious regions may be employed. An aggregated or composite display asshown in FIG. 2 might be implemented using a variety of softwareenvironments, including, for example, HTML5/CSS/Javascript, and may becreated client-side (e.g., within the user's browser), server-side(e.g., at social media site 106), or a combination thereof.

Report 112 includes information communicated by media player 104 tomedia source 102 for the purpose of, for example, reporting that aparticular user is watching or has watched particular media content.Report 112 might also be shared with other entities, such as socialmedia site 106 or other external sites.

In some embodiments, users may be able to simultaneously viewinteractions and discussions occurring within additional social mediasites (i.e., social media sites external to social media site 106). Forexample, a Twitter stream or other social media stream 206 relating tothe viewed media image may also be displayed in addition to mediacontent image 202 and interaction region 204, as shown in FIG. 2. Thisstream 206 may be determined, for example, by the content displayedwithin interaction region 204. That is, social media site may determine,through analysis of the content of interaction region 204 (includingtext, hashtags, links, etc.) that certain comments (e.g., “tweets”, ads,or the like) within stream 206 might be of interest to one or more ofthe users viewing media content 202. Stream 206 might appear the samefor all users viewing media content region 202, or may different,depending upon user-preference or other factors.

In some embodiments, the friends of a user may be notified that the useris currently (or had previously) viewed particular media content, whichmay be presented individually or as a list. The notification may beinitiated, for example, by media player 104, source 102, social mediasite 106, or any other component or system that is able to determinewhich user is viewing which content and to report such viewing to socialmedia site 106.

FIG. 3 generally depicts such a notification 302, in which a statusmessage is displayed (“Bob is now watching ‘Game of Thrones’”) on socialmedia site 106, indicating the media content being viewed and the friend(or friends) currently viewing that content. The friend is then provideda mechanism (e.g., any suitable user interface component, such as button306) to join the conversation. A thumbnail image 304 (corresponding to astill from the media content, or corresponding to media content 202 ofFIG. 2) may also be provided, which may be static or may change inreal-time based on what the user is currently viewing.

The user interfaces associated with the embodiments shown in FIGS. 2 and3 and indeed any other embodiments may include any number ofconventional and well known user interface components (menu items,lists, buttons, check-boxes, and the like), and may be implemented usingany suitable computer libraries/languages (e.g., HTML/CSS/JS, MacromediaFlash, a Facebook Widget, or the like). The invention is not so limited,however.

Since social media site 106 will generally know and store (e.g., withina conventional data store) the shared interests, preferences, “likes,”“topical hotspots”, etc. of users 108 and 110, it can providenotifications to a user's friends based on these common interests. Forexample, social media site 106 may know that a user Alice is generallyinterested in the fantasy novel genre, and that “Game of Thrones”generally fits within this genre. As a result, the system may send anotification to Alice letting her know that Bob is currently watching(or had previously watched) that show.

The flow-chart of FIG. 4 provides a single example, or use-case, inwhich the present invention may be employed. As shown, method 400—whichis described from the point-of-view of social media site 106—begins witha determination that a first user is viewing media content (402). As anon-limiting example, consider the case where the first user, Bob, hasbegun to watch a particular episode of a science fiction series receivedfrom a media player (e.g., a set-top box) that communicates with socialmedia site 106. The media content may be viewed by Bob within a browseron a desktop, within a smart-TV, or through any other media player 104.Next, in step 404, the system determines a second user who is a “friend”or otherwise within the same social group as Bob, and sends that user(say, Alice), a notification that Bob is watching the that episode ofthe show. The notification may appear as that shown in FIG. 3, with athumbnail and a button prompting Alice to join Bob in watching theepisode (step 406).

If Alice agrees (via clicking a button or the like), the media contentis provided to Alice as well (step 408). At the same time, aninteraction region is provided to allow Alice and Bob to chat, sendlinks, and so on with respect to the TV episode as it is playing (step410). The comments may be time-stamped based on the time at which thecomments were made relative to the TV episode. One or more social mediastreams relating to the media content may also be provided to Alice andBob while they watch the episode. For example, a Twitter feed relatingto that particular episode or characters within the episode (e.g.,#drwho, #daleks) may also be provided to Alice and Bob during theepisode (step 412). In addition, the system might know that a third user(say, Chad) who is a friend of Alice and/or Bob, may be interested inscience fiction, based on, for example, previous status updates,previous purchases, previous media consumption, previous books read, andany other information collected by social media site 106 (step 414).Chad may then be notified that Alice and/or Bob are viewing the episode,allowing him to socially view the episode as well (step 416). If Chadjoins the social viewing, or later views the episode, he may be able toscroll back through the interaction stream between Alice and Bob(synched with the media content itself), and view previous interactionsregarding the episode.

While several exemplary embodiments have been presented in the foregoingdetailed description, it should be appreciated that a vast number ofalternate but equivalent variations exist, and the examples presentedherein are not intended to limit the scope, applicability, orconfiguration of the invention in any way. To the contrary, variouschanges may be made in the function and arrangement of elementsdescribed without departing from the legal equivalents.

The invention claimed is:
 1. A method for social viewing of mediacontent, the method carried-out utilizing at least one server hosting asocial media site and having access to a database storing informationpertaining to groups of members of the social media site and commoninterests shared by the members, the method comprising: at the server,providing an interaction region associated with a media content regionfor viewing media content to enable users of at least a set comprising afirst and second user to share comments and interact in real-time asmedia content is viewed by the users for generating an interactionstream wherein the interaction stream comprises: a discussion betweenusers that are members of common groups; at the server, determining whenthe first user is viewing media content; when the first user is viewingmedia content, utilizing the information stored in the database toenable viewing by a second user in the common group of the first user;further utilizing the information stored in the database to determinewhether the media content corresponds to an interest shared by the firstuser and the second user; if determining that the media contentcorresponds to an interest shared by the first user and the second user,further determining whether the second user desires to view the mediacontent concurrently with the first user; if further determining thatsecond user desires to view the streaming media content concurrentlywith the first user, presenting the first user and the second user withthe media content along with the interaction region configured to allowthe first user and the second user to share comments by interacting inreal-time in the interaction region regarding the media content via theinteraction stream, wherein the media content is combined at a socialmedia site with shared comments provided by each user in the interactionregion and a social media stream related to the media content whereinthe related social media stream is determined by analysis of the sharedcomments in the interaction region of each user wherein each user sharescomments while viewing the media content and the social media stream inseparate regions wherein the social media stream viewed by each user isdependent at least on each user's preferences; and transmitting anotification to a third user who is a member of the common groups basedon the media content, profile information associated with the thirdmember on the social media site, and utilized information stored aboutthe third user wherein the utilized information comprises: previousstatus updates, previous purchases, previous media consumption, previousbooks read, and related information collected by the social media siteto enable the third member to join a social viewing to view the mediacontent concurrently with the first user and second user, or for viewinglater the media content wherein the third user can scroll back throughthe interaction stream between first and second user which is synchedwith the media content to view previous interactions regarding aparticular media content.
 2. The method of claim 1, wherein determiningwhether the second user desires to view the media content concurrentlywith the first user comprises: at the server, generating a notificationinforming the second user that the first user is currently viewing themedia content, the notification including a user interface componentoffering the second user the capability of viewing the media contentsimultaneously with the first user; and determining whether the seconduser desires to view the media content concurrently with the first userbased upon interaction of the second user with the user interfacecomponent.
 3. The method of claim 1, wherein the interaction streamincludes time-stamp information indicating times relative to the mediacontent that the comments were shared.
 4. The method of claim 1, whereinthe media content and the interaction region are rendered together in aweb browser window and displayed to the first user while the first useris accessing the social media site.
 5. A system for providing socialviewing of media content, comprising: a media player device; and atleast one server configured to host a social media site andcommunicatively coupled to the media player over a network, the serverconfigured to: provide an interaction region associated with a mediacontent region for viewing the media content to enable users comprisinga set of at least a first and second user to share comments and interactin real-time as the media content is viewed by the users for generatingan interaction stream; further determine when the first user is viewingmedia content by the social media site; when the first user is viewingmedia content by the social media site, utilize the information storedin the database to enable viewing by the second user in a common groupwith the first user; further utilize the information stored in thedatabase to determine whether the media content corresponds to aninterest shared by the first user and the second user; if determiningthat the media content corresponds to an interest shared by the firstand second users, determine whether the second user desires to view themedia content concurrently with the first user; if determining thatsecond user desires to view the streaming media content concurrentlywith the first user, present the first and second users with the mediacontent along with the interaction region configured to allow the firstuser and the second user to share comments by interacting in real-timein the interaction region regarding the media content, wherein the mediacontent presented to the first user is viewed from a media playerdevice, while the media content presented to the second user is obtainedfrom at least one of: a same media content source and the media playerdevice, wherein the media content from the same media source arecombined at a social media site with content provided by each user inthe interaction region and a social media stream related to the mediacontent wherein the related social media stream is determined byanalysis of the shared comments in the interaction region of each userwherein each user shares comments while viewing the media content andthe social media stream in separate regions wherein the social mediastream viewed by each user is dependent at least on each user'spreferences; and transmitting a notification to a third user who is amember of the common groups based on the media content, profileinformation associated with the third member on the social media site,and utilized information stored about the third user wherein theutilized information at least comprises: previous status updates,previous purchases, previous media consumption, previous books read, andrelated information collected by the social media site to enable thethird member to join a social viewing to view the media contentconcurrently with the first user and second user, or for viewing laterthe media content whereby the third user can scroll back through aprevious interaction stream between the first and second user which issynched with the media content to view previous interactions between thefirst and second user regarding a particular media content.
 6. Thesystem of claim 5, wherein the server is configured to determine whetherthe second user desires to view the media content concurrently with thefirst user by: generating a notification notifying the second user thatthe first user is currently viewing the media content, the notificationincluding a user interface component offering the second user thecapability of viewing the media content simultaneously with the firstuser; and determining whether the second user desires to view the mediacontent concurrently with the first user based upon interaction of thesecond user with the user interface component.
 7. The system of claim 5,wherein the interaction stream includes time-stamp informationindicating times relative to the media content that the comments wereshared.
 8. The system of claim 5, wherein the media source iscommunicatively coupled to the social media site.
 9. The method of claim1, wherein media content is presented to the first user by the socialmedia site via a media player device operated by the first user.
 10. Themethod of claim 9, wherein the media content presented to the seconduser is obtained from at least one of: a same media content source andthe media player device.
 11. A method for social viewing of mediacontent, the method carried-out utilizing at least one server hosting asocial media site and having access to a database storing informationpertaining to groups of members of the social media site and commoninterests shared by the members, the method comprising: at the server,providing an interaction region associated with a media content regionfor viewing media content to generate commentary from one or more usersfrom interactions between an user and media content viewed; at theserver, storing the commentary received from a first user while viewingmedia content displayed from a media player device; after the first userhas completed viewing the media content, utilizing the informationstored in the database for viewing by a second user in a common groupwith the first user; further utilizing the information stored in thedatabase to determine whether the media content corresponds to aninterest shared by the first user and the second user; if determiningthat the media content corresponds to an interest shared by the firstand second users, further determining whether the second user desires toview the media content and the commentary provided by the first user; iffurther determining that second user desires to view the streaming mediacontent, presenting the second user with the media content and thestored comments received from the first user; if further determiningthat second user desires to view the streaming media content bytransmitting a notification to a third user who is a member of thecommon group based on the media content, profile information associatedwith the third member on the social media site, and utilized informationstored about the third user wherein the utilized information at leastcomprises: previous status updates, previous purchases, previous mediaconsumption, previous books read, and related information collected bythe social media site, enabling the third member to join a socialviewing to view the media content concurrently with the first user andsecond user, or for viewing later the media content whereby the thirduser can scroll back through a previous interaction stream between thefirst and second user which is synched with the media content to viewprevious interactions between the first and second user regarding aparticular media content; and if the third user in the social viewing isconcurrently viewing the media content, the media is combined at asocial media site with content provided by each user in the interactionregion and a social media stream related to the media content whereinthe related social media stream is determined by analysis of the sharedcomments in the interaction region of each user wherein each user sharescomments while viewing the media content and the social media stream inseparate regions wherein the social media stream viewed by each user isdependent at least on each user's preferences.
 12. The method of claim11, wherein the media content, when presented to the second user by thesocial media site, is obtained from at least one of: a same mediacontent source and the media player device.